Harvey Police Chief Will Aid Probe Of His Force

Harvey Police Chief Bruce Terry said Monday that he will cooperate in an FBI investigation of possible corruption in his department.

Terry said that he has arranged an appointment with FBI agents Tuesday to discuss their investigation and a controversial drug raid by police at a Harvey tavern on Jan. 10.

Terry said he offered to turn over to FBI agents all police records on the raid, which two Harvey residents said was part of a plot to frame a Harvey patrolman who is cooperating in a federal investigation of police corruption.

Rinaldo Camera, 55, owner of the tavern, and Patricia Hill, 21, who sometimes patronizes the tavern, said they were taken into custody, driven by police to a motel in nearby South Holland and pressured into saying that they paid bribes to Harvey Patrolman Douglas Newton.

Later, when questioned by assistant Cook County state`s attorneys, they recanted, saying that they were forced by Harvey police to accuse Newton in an apparent effort to discredit him.

The state`s attorney`s office declined to bring charges in the case and has referred all findings to the U.S. attorney`s office.

Terry said reports that some of his men tried to frame a fellow officer or pressured citizens into making false statements were ``unbelievable in the wildest stretch of imagination.``

He said preliminary indications from his own investigation of the incident show ``no culpability on the part of any Harvey police officer.``

Terry said he will turn over to the FBI the investigative file on the drug raid on Camera`s tavern, at 15440 Center Ave., and the statements Camera and Hill made to police.

He said FBI agents are free to question members of the Harvey police tactical unit who conducted the raid.